|
I am a theist. I believe in an absolute eternal being. It appears to me impossible to believe in any type of ontological thruths without also a belief in an absolute being. I hold that absolute truths, such as the principle of non-contradiction, are absolute being. Eternally existing truth is God. The same is true for aesthetics. Beauty is an objective thing not a mere opinion. Beauty is God. However, were I not a theist, I would probably ascribe to the views of Logical Positivism. quote:The logical positivists' initial stance was that a statement is "cognitively meaningful" only if some finite procedure conclusively determines its truth. By this verifiability principle, only statements verifiable either by their analyticity or by empiricism were cognitively meaningful. Metaphysics, ontology, as well as much of ethics failed this criterion, and so were found cognitively meaningless. Moritz Schlick, however, did not view ethical or aesthetic statements as cognitively meaningless. Cognitive meaningfulness was variously defined: having a truth value; corresponding to a possible state of affairs; naming a proposition; intelligible or understandable as are scientific statements. A.J Ayer famously compared the statement "You should not steal." as being the equivalent of stating "Yay for not stealing!" He contended that all moral statements were nothing more that Emotivism, the belief that ethical sentences do not express propositions but mere emotional attitudes. I know there are many non-theists who hold deep ethical and moral beliefs. I'm wondering how you respond to the positivists. Where is the verifiability for your moral and ethical claims? You can't prove with science that it's "wrong" to do anything can you? So why do you believe it? AARO fucked around with this message at 05:38 on May 19, 2016 |
#
?
May 19, 2016 05:32
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 23, 2024 17:51 |
|
|
The verificationist criteria of meaning is itself not verifiable, and so by its own lights meaningless. This is the most common criticism of logical positivism and is usually considered the knock-down argument. Most modern ethicists have complex theories, but a very popular kind is contractualism. The classic statement is due to TM Scanlon quote:An act is wrong if its performance under the circumstances would be disallowed by any set of principles for the general regulation of behaviour that no one could reasonably reject as a basis for informed, unforced, general agreement. Now whether this works or not, or various details, is a different story, but meets the criteria you're interested in. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/contractualism/ is a good discussion of the view. There are many varieties of what's called moral realism, both which are naturalist and non-naturalist (in this context it basically means that moral concepts can only be explained by reference to moral concepts...this is oversimplifying but it'll do), and don't appeal to God or anything like that.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 05:54
|
|
|
I know relatively few people who embrace LP because it is a "closed" philosophical system which theistic morality tends to do better since there is something outside the system that serves to make it closed. LP just recreates Christian enlightenment philosophy without a god. It's deism where the world is still a watch just without a watchmaker. We need to MacIntyre this poo poo and recognize that our moral and ethical language comes from religion (tradition/religiophilosophy whatever you want to call the transgenerational transmission of norms). If we use the language if a particular religiophilosophy abstracted (or sometimes even purposefully distanced) from said religiophilosophy you will absolutely end up with nonsense statements like your example with AJ Ayer. But that also applies to your abstracted definition of God. Let's go with Master Esai's ontology: "I know nothing of Buddhas past, present or future, but I know cows exist." Under this ontological framework, this would make cows God to you. Are cows God?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 06:04
|
|
|
olin posted:Where is the verifiability for your moral and ethical claims? You can't prove with science that it's "wrong" to do anything can you? So why do you believe it? Pretty sure you can compare cultures where stealing is okay and stealing is not okay and see how well the populations are getting on, scientifically. It's been said before, also, that giving women the right to own their own property, the right to work, access to education and freedom over their own reproduction raises the economical and sociological floor of any mud-hut 3rd world village. There are lots of moral values that can be shown through scientific method to be the best, or at least a good, way for human societies to function under. But anyway, morality is relative to the person, and comes from people. This can be seen in all the religious people who move between, say, Christian churches to find the one that more closely match and espouse the values that they themselves hold. No God told them what values were good or bad, they just seek out the ones that they like and then claim divine providence on the issue after the fact.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 06:14
|
|
|
Ghost of Reagan Past posted:The verificationist criteria of meaning is itself not verifiable, and so by its own lights meaningless. This is the most common criticism of logical positivism and is usually considered the knock-down argument. The same could be said about the principle of non-contradiction or the principle of identify. One could just respond that such principles cannot be proven but can be known. These basic principles are different than "You should not steal." in that they can be seen as true by reason alone. That's what I'd say as a positivist anyway. Shbobdb posted:
Edit: I misspoke before. Matter is not eternal but only potentially so. It had a cause and can into being at some point and therefore is not God. AARO fucked around with this message at 15:09 on May 19, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 06:20
|
|
|
It's a stretch to look for the truth value of imperative statements. Truth is overrated in natural language anyway. There are plenty of ethical theories that aren't concerned with truth at all. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-anti-realism/ foot fucked around with this message at 06:33 on May 19, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 06:31
|
|
|
Acknowledging that something is up to subjective meaning does not preclude believing or fighting for it, that idea comes from confusing theories of knowledge and ethics. While knowledge informs ethics, it cannot determine them, so it's not actually that difficult to do what you're saying - in fact, I'd go further and say that even theism doesn't save from emotivism, because even if you believe god exists, you cannot prove that it is moral.Ghost of Reagan Past posted:The verificationist criteria of meaning is itself not verifiable, and so by its own lights meaningless. This is the most common criticism of logical positivism and is usually considered the knock-down argument.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 07:32
|
|
|
rudatron posted:It's considered a knock down proof by people unfamiliar with the subject matter - axioms cannot prove themselves, this isn't something unique to positivism, Godel would have something to say about that. Yes, but this is a blunting of the verificationist sword - you can no longer say that certain statements about metaphysical states of affairs are meaningless full stop, you can only really say that you are unwilling to accept the axiomatic system under which they are meaningful. Which is more Carnap than Ayer; not nearly as flashy, because you can't go around telling people they're fundamentally and systematically mistaken about what they think they mean when they speak. That is, it is not the positivists reliance on the principle of verification that is a problem, it is their insistence that it is the only justifiable axiom. Edit, to respond to the OP: olin posted:It appears to me impossible to believe in any type of ontological thruths without also a belief in an absolute being. What do you mean by 'ontological truth,' and why do you think our epistemic relationship with such things is dependent on theism? One simple way to read 'ontological truths' is just 'facts about what things exist' in which case it looks like you're saying that we can't know that there is an external world unless there is a God to vouchsafe that belief for us. Which is just Descartes all over again. Not that that's a problem, it's just that Descartes wasn't the last word in that debate. Juffo-Wup fucked around with this message at 12:41 on May 19, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 12:28
|
|
|
olin posted:I know there are many non-theists who hold deep ethical and moral beliefs. I'm wondering how you respond to the positivists. Where is the verifiability for your moral and ethical claims? You can't prove with science that it's "wrong" to do anything can you? So why do you believe it? If I like the color orange I can recognize that's a subjective belief and I feel no need to assert it's some sort of universal truth, yet I have no reason to give up the belief that orange is a nice color.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 12:51
|
|
|
olin posted:No, only all eternally existing beings are God. If it is true that protons and electrons are eternal and never decay I guess I would include them as God, and therefore all matter as God. To the best of my knowledge, science doesn't know if electrons are eternal. This seems like an extremely poor definition of God. If protons and electrons truly are eternal, what is gained by including them under the label "God"? Being made of protons and electrons, would I thus be a god as well?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 13:41
|
|
|
Even if we accept your rather dubious foundation, how do we derive moral truths from your ontology? If electrons are god, is it holy (morally good) to run across the carpet? Increasing my static charge should make me more godly. Would touching a doorknob be bad? God is literally leaving my body. If we associate god with the good and god is electrons that would make me less good.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 13:41
|
|
|
Who What Now posted:This seems like an extremely poor definition of God. If protons and electrons truly are eternal, what is gained by including them under the label "God"? Being made of protons and electrons, would I thus be a god as well? Not too many real theists around any more. It's always some airy crystal voyage poo poo like this.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 14:24
|
|
|
olin posted:I know there are many non-theists who hold deep ethical and moral beliefs. I'm wondering how you respond to the positivists. Where is the verifiability for your moral and ethical claims? You can't prove with science that it's "wrong" to do anything can you? So why do you believe it? I hold those beliefs for two reasons. First, I'm wired for empathy so if you suffer then so do I. Second, most agree that pleasure is preferable to suffering so we're all bound by a common interest to maximize the former over the latter. Doing otherwise is fundamentally irrational and is playing the odds that others won't eventually ignore your needs. I don't care if an action is objectively proven to be good or bad. I have rational reasons to behave in a framework that maximizes pleasure for as many people as possible. It makes me feel good and it maximizes my own chances of happiness. Moreover, my moral code comes from me. This is what I feel and I make these decisions. A moral code given to you, is just rules you follow because you've been told to. What if I disagree wildly with those rules? I don't think slavery is good but religions and cultures have held that it was and backed it up with scripture and philosophical musings. Well I don't care. I don't care if a supreme being is proven to exist and that its moral code includes slavery. My moral code will still say it's bad.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 14:36
|
|
|
Juffo-Wup posted:
I'm saying that eternally existing truths, or you could just say truth, are/is God. I do not mean that as an equivocation. God is the collection of all eternally existent being. quote:Even if we accept your rather dubious foundation, how do we derive moral truths from your ontology? I misspoke before. Electrons are not God as they are not actually infinite but only potentially infinite. They had a cause, which means they began at some point, which means they are not actually infinite but only potentially. I believe that a moral law is infused into us at creation by God. I have provided no evidence for my belief that morals come from God. I also believe Him to be an uncaused, personal, creator of the universe, who sans the universe, changeless, immaterial, timeless, spaceless, and enormously powerful. But I haven't explained why. I wasn't really looking for a debate about the existence of God. I just wanted to know how people arrived at morals without eternally existing being. If you'd like to we can talk about that. I like the Kalam Cosmological Argument for the existence of God. If we're going to talk about that it'd be better if you read the argument first if you are unfamiliar with it. I'd rather not type out the whole argument here as it is explained well many places online AARO fucked around with this message at 15:02 on May 19, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 14:47
|
|
|
olin posted:I'm saying that eternally existing truths, or you could just say truth, are/is God. I do not mean that as an equivocation. God is the collection of all eternally existent being. How is that useful? Do you believe that God has an active will, an intelligence? Or is it just things that are "eternal"? What value does your definition of God hold? quote:I believe that a moral law is infused into us at creation by God. I have provided no evidence for my belief that morals come from God. I also believe Him to be an uncaused, personal, creator of the universe, who sans the universe, changeless, immaterial, timeless, spaceless, and enormously powerful. But I haven't explained why. I wasn't really looking for a debate about the existence of God. I just wanted to know how people arrived at morals without eternally existing being. Is the KSA what actually convinced you that God is real? If not, what actually did convince you?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 14:54
|
|
|
Who What Now posted:How is that useful? Do you believe that God has an active will, an intelligence? Or is it just things that are "eternal"? What value does your definition of God hold? Your first question is explained by the second part of what you quoted me saying. I believe that truth is God and God is truth but that's not the only thing I believe about God. Why are you asking the second question?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:06
|
|
|
olin posted:Your first question is explained by the second part of what you quoted me saying. I believe that truth is God and God is truth but that's not the only thing I believe about God. Ok, can you please lay out more clearly what you believe about God, and why your definition is useful? quote:Why are you asking the second question? Because if Kalam didn't actually convince you about God then why would you assume it would convince anyone else? I want to know what ultimately convinced you because that's where a meaningful discussion will lie, if there's one to be had at all.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:10
|
|
|
Op what do you think of the categorical imperative?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:17
|
|
|
Who What Now posted:
I was born into a very Catholic family. To this day my mother still goes to mass every single day. Around 12 years old I stopped believing and called myself agnostic but at 18 or so arguments like the KCA along with personal experiences made me believe again. It was actually Dr. Fritz Wenisch's Finiteness of the Past paper* that made me believe a creator of the universe was a reasonable assertion. But it was personal experiences involving Christian prayer and small miracles that really made me believe in Christianity again. I have a lot of doubts about Christianity these days (anti-homosexuality, strange happenings in the bible like God killing children, etc) but I'd still call myself a Christian and I don't doubt the existence of a creator. I may sometime in the very near future stop calling myself a Christian, or perhaps I will get very strongly into it again. I'm doing a lot of reading about it right now trying to find out if Christianity is actually true or not. That's partly what inspired this thread. *That argument is simple. This present moment depends on for it's existence the completion of the entire past. As it would have taken an eternal amount of time to arrive at this present moment were past time infinite, the past must be finite. Therefore a beginning--> A creator. AARO fucked around with this message at 15:35 on May 19, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:29
|
|
|
olin posted:*That argument is simple. This present moment depends on for it's existence the completion of the entire past. As it would have taken an eternal amount of time to arrive at this present moment were past time infinite, the past must be finite. Therefore a beginning--> A creator. There are infinite numbers, does this mean it is impossible to count to 7? Is it impossible to count to 7 quadrillion (setting aside the limits of mortality)? If not, why is it then impossible to get to a finite point in an infinite timeline?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:34
|
|
|
Who What Now posted:There are infinite numbers, does this mean it is impossible to count to 7? Is it impossible to count to 7 quadrillion (setting aside the limits of mortality)? If not, why is it then impossible to get to a finite point in an infinite timeline? W.L. Craig posted:…a Realist might say that there is an actually infinite number of mathematical objects, and because mathematical objects really exist, this disproves premise that an actual infinite cannot exist. But to do this, the Realist is going to have to rebut the arguments for Anti-Realism coming from Conventionalists, Deductivists, Fictionalists, Structuralists, Constructibilists, and Figuralists.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:39
|
|
|
Utilitarianism should be good enough for everyone. You take a vote on what the goal is, or however your political system does that, and then let the experts work out how to best get there. Morality is not a factor.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:39
|
|
|
Ok, show me those arguments and I will rebut them. And I'm interested in talking to you, not with Craig through you as an medium. Please use your own words.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:41
|
|
|
I'm not joking about kantian deontological ethics btw
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:47
|
|
|
olin posted:I'm saying that eternally existing truths, or you could just say truth, are/is God. I do not mean that as an equivocation. God is the collection of all eternally existent being. I don't understand what this means. 'Truth' is the name we give to a certain kind of relationship between propositions and the world: a well-formed proposition describes a certain state of affairs, and if that state of affairs obtains in the world then the proposition in true. For example, the proposition 'Obama is the president' is true just in case Obama is the president. It is very strange to call that relationship 'God,' but I guess strangeness alone isn't necessarily a reason to reject a view. More importantly, how do you expect this to give you firmer ground for moral knowledge than the person who does not see divinity in that relation? What extra metaphysical/epistemic work is the divinity doing?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:55
|
|
|
Zas posted:I'm not joking about kantian deontological ethics btw Kant has just never personally blown the wind up my skirt. I also wonder couldn't all categorical imperatives be turned into hypothetical imperatives by asking "why should I follow X categorical imperative." That idea might have some kind of serious flaw as I read the bare minimum of Kant in college and don't know anything of his defenses. Kant just always bored me for some reason.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 15:57
|
|
|
Juffo-Wup posted:
I explained this above. I believe in a personal, changeless, unbelievably powerful absolute being who was the creator of the universe. Admittedly, I probably miswrote the OP and shouldn't have been intentionally vague. My obfuscation has just provided confusion. It just that I was not trying to start a "does God exist?" DD thread as we all know how well receive that poo poo is on this forum. I wanted to know about non-theistic morality as I've never seen such a system like that that I found particularly persuasive. I should add that the notion of God as truth and truth as God is very old and very well respected amoung theists. St. Thomas Aquinas posted:
AARO fucked around with this message at 16:19 on May 19, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:03
|
|
|
olin posted:I explained this above. I believe in a personal, changeless, unbelievably powerful absolute being who was the creator of the universe. Admittedly, I probably miswrote the OP and shouldn't have been intentionally vague. My obfuscation has just provided confusion. It just that I was not trying to start a "does God exist?" DD thread as we all know how well receive that poo poo is on this forum. One's choice of moral system probably has to be comparitive, and you still haven't explained how your moral system follows from theism. Unless you endorse some such system, we'll be at a loss as to what you would find persuasive. So if you're not up to deriving moral facts from theism, at least tell us how you expect a derivation of moral facts to proceed. e.g. what kinds of reasons are acceptable? Juffo-Wup fucked around with this message at 16:24 on May 19, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:09
|
|
|
olin posted:I explained this above. I believe in a personal, changeless, unbelievably powerful absolute being who was the creator of the universe. Admittedly, I probably miswrote the OP and shouldn't have been intentionally vague. My obfuscation has just provided confusion. It just that I was not trying to start a "does God exist?" DD thread as we all know how well receive that poo poo is on this forum. Well in order to show a non-theistic morality system that you would find persuasive we have to know why you find your current systems persuasive. So far we only know you can quote other people and that "miracles" have happened to you. That doesn't give us a very good basis for demonstrating anything to you.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:16
|
|
|
I find the lack of objectivity in non-theistic moral systems to make them unfeasible. To murder a random person is wrong. That is not merely an opinion but a fact. I couldn't ascribe to an ethical system that just says "Well, I don't want to murder a person because it would make me feel bad therefore I don't do it."
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:24
|
|
|
Murdering a random person is wrong because it has negative utility to society as a whole.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:26
|
|
|
olin posted:I find the lack of objectivity in non-theistic moral systems to make them unfeasible. To murder a random person is wrong. That is not merely an opinion but a fact. I couldn't ascribe to an ethical system that just says "Well, I don't want to murder a person because it would make me feel bad therefore I don't do it." But how do you know that murdering someone is objectively wrong? To put it a bit inflammatory, if God had ordained that murder was objectively good, would you consider it ethical?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:28
|
|
|
olin posted:I couldn't ascribe to an ethical system that just says "Well, I don't want to murder a person because it would make me feel bad therefore I don't do it." I don't want to murder a person because the societal contract I would be establishing in doing so would imply that murdering me would also be acceptable. And I don't want to be murdered. Therefore I shouldn't murder a person. doverhog posted:Murdering a random person is wrong because it has negative utility to society as a whole. Also this.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:30
|
|
|
olin posted:I find the lack of objectivity in non-theistic moral systems to make them unfeasible. To murder a random person is wrong. That is not merely an opinion but a fact. I couldn't ascribe to an ethical system that just says "Well, I don't want to murder a person because it would make me feel bad therefore I don't do it." But you don't have any objectivity either. You claim to, but you can't demonstrate it.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:32
|
|
|
A very close friend of mine is an atheist and doesn't believe objective "right or wrong". I asked him what about if he could steal hundreds of thousands of dollars from his parents in an untraceable way and absolutely get away with it with no suspicion would he do it? I asked wouldn't that be objectively wrong. He said nothing is objectively wrong. He said that no he wouldn't do it because he loves his family and wouldn't want to hurt them. Then I asked if he would steal the money from a large corporation under the same circumstances with total assurance of never getting caught. He said "gently caress yea he would. They have insurance so I'm not really hurting anyone except some minor lose at an insurance bureau." That type of ethics bothers me although he is being totally logically consistent.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:38
|
|
|
olin posted:A very close friend of mine is an atheist and doesn't believe objective "right or wrong". I asked him what about if he could steal hundreds of thousands of dollars from his parents in an untraceable way and absolutely get away with it with no suspicion would he do it? I asked wouldn't that be objectively wrong. He said nothing is objectively wrong. He said that no he wouldn't do it because he loves his family and wouldn't want to hurt them. Then I asked if he would steal the money from a large corporation under the same circumstances with total assurance of never getting caught. He said "gently caress yea he would. They have insurance so I'm not really hurting anyone except some minor lose at an insurance bureau." Ok, but that seems like something you should bring up with your friend, not us.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:40
|
|
|
olin posted:That type of ethics bothers me although he is being totally logically consistent. I think the interesting question is: Why specifically does it bother you? Does it bother you because his values don't reflect your own moral code? Does it bother you because he applies different standards to his family than to a corporation? Or does it bother you because being subjective means his values are subject to constant changes and thus unpredictable to a certain extent?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:45
|
|
|
Who What Now posted:But you don't have any objectivity either. You claim to, but you can't demonstrate it. Perhaps with morality we have a phenomenological epistemic justification for the knowledge of right and wrong through Husserlian eidetic intuition.
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:46
|
|
|
doverhog posted:Murdering a random person is wrong because it has negative utility to society as a whole. In utilitarianism wouldn't you be obligated to torture an innocent child to death if your doing so would save 10,000 other lives?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:50
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 23, 2024 17:51 |
|
|
olin posted:In utilitarianism wouldn't you be obligated to torture an innocent child to death if your doing so would save 10,000 other lives? Would it be moral if God asked you to torture a child?
|
|
#
?
May 19, 2016 16:53
|
|